"How do you approach stuckness?"

Workplace erections, risk, experiments

A couple of weeks ago I asked my readers what questions they had for me. 

One guy I’ll call Jack responded and asked: “How do you approach a plaguing sense of “stuckness”? When the world is passing you by and you’re comfortably numb to its beauty, how do you jolt yourself back alive? How do you breathe excitement and the feeling of personal progress & development back into the gray lifeless lump of inertia?”

Well, Jack, you caught me at a good time. I'm fresh off of another reading of the Way of the Superior Man.

The answer is that you have to get your dick hard. Maybe literally, but definitely as it relates to your life as a whole.

Stuckness and numbness are flaccid penis life characteristics, metaphorically. I've been there many times before—whenever I'm not pushing myself, I'm playing it safe, I've become complacent. I'm waiting for my woman or the world to come to me. In these times I become overly self-conscious, anxious, and afraid. I become envious. I wish I just had the courage that so-and-so has to really go for my dreams. Or I become depressed that life isn't how I want it to be.

You have to stroke your dick more, Jack. As David Deida, author of Way of the Superior Man, might say, you have to push your edge more, or push more of your edges.

Philosopher Simone Weil says that "Risk is an essential need of the soul. The absence of risk produces a kind of boredom which paralyzes in a different way from fear, but almost as much."

So just do something risky like have unprotected sex with a prostitute you meet on 6th street that seems like a really nice lady but is a prostitute nonetheless or ride a dirt bike on way too much ketamine?

No Jack. Definitely NOT that.

Push your edges and take risks in the direction of things that matter to you.

Pay extra special attention to the places where fear or envy show up. Those could highlight things that you actually want, but feel deficient in. Working towards growth in those areas has always brought me the most excitement, pride and aliveness.

In the past I felt terrified of public speaking and envious of people who could do it well. I went to Toastmasters, took speaking gigs, and did hundreds of podcasts in part to overcome this fear. Every moment spent on these things, I felt alive.

I also felt scared of playing music in front of a bunch of people. So I put a date on the calendar to busk on one of the busiest streets in Austin. Holy shit did I feel alive.

I envied people who loved the work they did and were really good at it. So I tested out idea after idea, always willing to start all over.

I envied people that told me about wild sex stories. So I decided to curate my own wild sex story with my wife.

Stuckness is lack of movement. So move. Develop an action bias. Spend less time thinking about the perfect thing to do and more time trying new things.

What can you do if you're feeling stuck in a particular area, such as work?

You can change up how you work.

You can change what you do for work.

You can change what you’re doing outside of work.

How you work

Maybe you're a designer just doing freelance work to pay the bills. What if you sought out clients who were doing work that you found to be more meaningful and who gave you the reins to be more creative and artistic with your work?

What you do for work

Some people, like the famous primatologist Jane Goodall, know what their calling is from a young age. The rest of us find it by trial and error.

So push yourself to try things that seem fun, exciting, and fulfilling. 

Outside of work

If you’re doing the above and still feel this stuckness, then do the same for other areas of your life.

Relationship. Start a tantric sex practice.

Community. Start a men's group.

Self-expression. Start playing the fiddle.

Play. Join a local spikeball league. But don’t challenge me if you don’t like getting embarrassed.

Adventure. Plan a solo camping trip.

Physical. Sign up for a race.

Aim to push your edges in every area of your life. Not too far as to blow yourself out and ruin your self esteem with too much failure, but enough to get a little chub. Enough that you need to hide it in your waistband but not enough to do any real damage yet.

Set up experiments that you can implement very quickly with the least effort possible.

When you start taking these slightly calculated risks in the direction of things that matter to you, you'll almost immediately start to feel more energized in your life. You'll start to feel more confident, more excited to wake up in the morning, and possibly be sent to the HR department for bringing an erection to work. 

Have a question you’d like me to answer in a future newsletter? Just respond directly to this email.